excellent. let's bring in mark murray. mark, does this tell us there was too much focus on his personal story and trying to get people to like him as opposed to specifics how, for example, he would create the 12 million jobs he says he can bring to the table? >> i think there were a lot of factors why mitt romney's speech didn't get the scores we ended up seeing at past convention speeches over past conventions, and one of the reasons that you kind of look at everything and it has to do with a lot of the polarization out in the country. everyone was locked in their corners and that was evident back in april before the conventions took place. but this convention in charlotte gives president obama the opportunity to say, look, we can get a bounce, this is a lot of momentum heading into the election day on november 6th. >> you point out he's not seen a bounce at least so far. what does that mean? >> well, you just -- what

essentially that means is with the white house and the obama campaign really want to accomplish here is get a lot of excitement out. i have to say, tamron, i was in tampa, the mood was subdued due to isaac. as you can tell behind me, everyone is very fired up. that's one of the things they really want to get across. the other thing is they want to tell the president's story and really move forward. that's the message that they want to tell. >> all right, mark murray, thank you very much. we'll talk more about the gallup numbers later and as our team points out, it may have obama feeling confident after struggling this weekend to answer the question are you better off now than you were four years ago. team obama trying to get on one message, one accord, as they head into their convention. >> are we better off today than we were four years ago when president obama was elected? >> absolutely. by any measure, the country has moved forward over the past four years. >> america is better off today

than they left us when they left. let me just sum it up this way, folks. you want to know whether we're better off, i have a little bumper sticker for you, osama bin laden is dead and general motors is alive! >> so the big push to answer this question comes after the romney campaign pushed maryland governor martin o'maley's response this weekend as an admission by democrats that things are not better. >> can you honestly say that people are better off today than they were four years ago? >> no, but that's not the question of this election. >> now, the governor later back tracked saying we are better off now than we were four years ago. let me bring in our "news nation" political panel today, eugene robinson, chris kofinas. chris, i'll start off with you, team obama plans to say, listen, are you better off in the future, let's look at the future and the next four years as part of the message coming out of

charlotte. >> yeah, tamron, just kind of politics 101 when asked that question are you better off now than four years ago, when the romney campaign is saying no, the obama campaign, politics 101, says yes. it's not -- this is not brain surgery here. it's not rocket science. and they can make that argument. the economy was in free fall four years ago. we were losing 100,000 jobs a week or something like that, and so, yes, things are better off than they were when he took office. objectively, i think they ought to say that. >> chris, why did martin o'maley struggle to answer the question? to eugene's point, it would only seem logical when you think about where we were, people were losing their homes far more than at this point. we saw the unemployment and the loss of jobs at an epic point. we were near, as many said, a depression. >> right. you know, i don't know why he

answered it the way he did. to me, it's an obvious answer, it's yes. if you look at the, you know, the criteria by which you should measure your president, dealing with the crisis, the country was headed over a financial cliff. the president saved us. we are in the midst of a recovery. we are growing jobs. we've created millions of jobs. bin laden is dead, general motors is alive, that the vice president said. you can make a strong argument the last four years is successful. and there's more work to be done. that's fine to say the second part, but to make the argument the president hasn't done an incredibly good job, the republicans are ignoring reality. >> is that fair, you can't sugar coat the fact governor o'maley, his initial reaction was we're not better off. that's not a good sign. whatever you want to call it, may have been a truthful moment for him, that he later backtracked.

>> it sounds to me he was answering the question do people feel better now than they felt four years ago. that's a better question than is the country objectively better off than it was four years ago. look, he's got a lot of constituents and a lot of voters across the country that feel bad now. it may have affected their friends and families' employment situations, so that's why you've seen democrats walking a very fine line between saying, yes, things are better, but they are not there yet. any time there's a new jobs report, in fact, you've heard the obama administration careful to calibrate that statement. you see them doing it again. convention week is the time you want to be more sweetness and light than the rest of the time, but they can't say, look, it's all fixed and it wasn't four years ago, because that's not how a lot of people feel. >> eugene, let me bring you in, this gallup poll has come out and shows mitt romney got no

bounce from his speech. people were not impressed what they heard. this despite the fact our first read team seems to believe if he was going to get any traction, this line of i wish president obama had succeeded because i want america to succeed and he offered a disappointment to people so high and happy he'd been elected. that line, if this number's correct, this gallup poll, didn't work either. >> very interesting. i mean, that the bounce is so minimal, at least as presently measured. we'll have to keep looking at it in the next few days. i think there are two possibilities, one, the country is polarized, people are set on which way they want to go in this election. there aren't that many genuinely undecided voters, i think, but the second possibility is there's a real opportunity here for president obama and the democrats in this convention to make progress, to essentially get a bounce. if romney didn't get one, if you

could get one, we could go into the home stretch of this election with a little separation between the candidates as opposed to a neck and neck race. we'll know in the next couple weeks. >> eugene, what about the fact, and this again is coming from the democrats, the question is not are you better off than four years ago, but are you going to be better off tomorrow and who is best positioned to take you there. is that, perhaps, at the heart of the reaction that we are seeing in these gallup poll numbers, eugene? >> yes. it is, you know, the republicans wanted this to be a referendum on president obama's economic performance over the last four years. it's not a simple referendum on that. it's all a referendum on mitt romney and whether or not he's -- he would be good as a president. i think you could guess that perhaps he didn't fully convince people during the convention, but again, i think we need to let these numbers settle a little bit after the democrats

get their bounce. we'll see where we end up. if i were, you know, with the democratic party right now, i'd feel pretty good going into this convention. >> anne, let me bring in the fact again from romney's speech, this nostalgic sounding, the way we were, the america we once were. andrea mitchell talked to a female voter who was and is worried that the republicans and mitt romney and some of the things he's pledged to get where he is to win that republican primary would certainly turn into a glass ceiling for women. >> well, certainly, that's something that the democrats have tried to make the most of. all the nostalgia is fine for people who remember past eras longingly, but for a lot of women, working women, women who care about reproductive rights, it would be a turning the clock backwards that they wouldn't want. there's inherent risk across the board for the romney campaign that's doing anything backward

looking. not because it might not seem realistic to all kinds of voters, but because a lot of voters still blame president bush, the most recent president bush, for the economic situation, so there might be some rosy remembrances for the past, but that's not for everyone. >> i want to play, back-to-back, anne, romney on saturday compared president obama to a losing coach. we just got president obama's response. let me play what governor romney said and the president's response just today to it. >> 23 million people are out of work or stopped looking for work or underemployed. let me tell you, if you have a coach that's 0 and 23 million, you say it's time to get a new coach. >> he said he's going to be the coach that leads america to a winning season. the problem is, everybody's already seen his economic playbook. on first down, he hikes taxes on

nearly -- by nearly $2,000 on the average family with kids in order to pay for a massive tax cut for multimillionaires. sounds like unnecessary roughness for me. >> sounds like too much sports and football for me, but chris -- and i like football, but nonetheless from all of these comparisons, god bless the cowboys who play this week, one of the notes from politico is the democrats and president obama need to rebuild the you didn't build that. the president and his team have to grab that ball and rebuild and accurately drill into the heads of the people out there what the president said and what he meant. >> yeah, or else it's going to be third down with ten seconds left on the clock. >> anne, i will walk off. >> what kind of campaign would it be if we didn't have sports metaphors? don't forget, it's a marathon, not a sprint. responding to or redirecting the accusations about you didn't build that.

it's not something they have an immediate answer for, although they would say it was taken out of context. what's interesting is that the democrats have said, look, it was taken out of context. this is just one of many lies that the romney campaign is going to tell about president obama, so it's not a direct rebuttal, but one they think is going to be effective. >> do you agree with that, the democrats don't have a direct rebuttal to the you didn't build that, even though it was taken out of context and used in a way not articulated by the president? >> i think you go right at it. clearly, people build their businesses, and what the president and democrats look at in terms of government is basically help where need be. and when you look at the crisis that the country was in when the president got elected, there is not a reasonable person that can argue if the government hadn't acted, we wouldn't be worse off. that doesn't mean government is the answer to everyone's problems, doesn't mean the government builds businesses, but it can be a helping hand. i think most reasonable people look at that, and i don't think we should shy away from it.

and more importantly, going into this election and convention, i think we should make the case very clearly not just that romney's policies would be bad, but ask yourself where the country would be right now if mitt romney or a republican had won four year ago. the country would be worse off by every metric. so how is the country going to be better off the next four years with the same kind of policies? >> how tough an argument do you make? how down and dirty, perhaps that's not the best description of it, should democrats get? and i point to the fact you have matthew dowd slam paul ryan for what he referred to as stretching the truth in his speech. let me play what a republican critic is now saying. >> paul ryan, what he did in his speech, i think so stretched the truth, and i like paul ryan, have a lot of great respect for paul ryan, but closing the gm plant, which closed before barack obama took president, simpson bowles bill, which he

opposed, then faults barack obama for. at some point, the truth should matter. >> so will the truth be told this week, chris, and how tough do the democrats need to push on that? i've read something about this tripod of lies that plan to expose. >> well, i think the surrogates, especially a lot of speakers, you know, not necessarily in primetime, have a important role to play. they go right at republicans and kind of attack these lies and misstatements. in terms of the primetime hour, in particular, i'd say, for the president's speech, you got to walk that line, and that line is you don't want to go negative. i think the president's strength, why he got elected and people still believe in him, he has a positive vision for the country. justify, explain what he did over the last four years, and paint the vision where he's going to take the country. we have a very good story to tell. >> let me bring in, quickly, eugene, we're almost out of time, one of the other things politico says that the democrats need to watch out for is hurricane bill.

not hurricane clint eastwood, which nobody saw coming, nobody forecast that, but hurricane bill clinton that could roll in. doesn't take his talking points from anyone, he says pretty much what he wants to say. >> yeah, he says what he wants to say, but he's better at this than clint eastwood. he's not going to go there. he's going to -- he's going to get up there, and i predict he's going to deliver a full-throated endorsement of president obama. not just an endorsement, but a rationale of why voters should vote for him. but one thing, tamron, i think i'm going to have to blow the whistle and throw the flag for the cowboys' reference. >> no more football analogies, please. >> redskins fans don't know. >> last note, they are called america's team for a reason. thank you very much. oh, you d.c. people don't let it go. >> illegal procedure. >> anne, thank you very much.

we'll stay away from sports. chris, thank you. thank you, eugene. as mentioned, president obama will touch down in a couple of hours in louisiana to tour the damage of hurricane isaac. then it's charlotte or bust. plus, questions surrounding the levy system that was designed to protect new orleans. did the levy actually make flooding worse in areas outside the city? that's one of the questions being asked. and paul ryan's fish story. his reason for inaccurately stating his marathon time, of all things. it's just one of those things we thought you should know. join our conversation on twitter @tamronhall. with the spark cash card from capital one,

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on the gulf coast, flooding from isaac could lead to even more evacuations very soon. officials worry about the rising pearl river, which could endanger thousands of homes. president obama will head to louisiana moments from now, not very far from where a lot of this video was taken. there he will meet with local officials, tour storm damage, and view response and recovery efforts. meanwhile, the army corps of engineers will investigate whether new orleans' upgrades caused flooding problems in surrounding communities. 120,000 customers in louisiana still without power. that's a week after isaac blew through that state. gabe gutierrez is in a location not very far from where the president will tour later in louisiana. gabe, a lot of damage still

behind you. >> reporter: that's exactly right, tamron, we're here in laplace and president obama is scheduled to travel here in just a few hours, a trip the white house says was scheduled before mitt romney's trip to louisiana last friday. and behind me is what the president will see, people's lives in their front yards. residents here are still cleaning up the damage days after hurricane isaac blew through here, and this neighborhood in particular took about four feet of water in the streets, several inches in homes. it might not sound like a lot, but it's amazing what several inches of water in homes can do. the president of st. john the baptist parish here plans to stress to president obama a need for a levy system outside of new orleans to protect some of the smaller towns. we kept hearing that over and over again from the residents here. many of them feel they've been ignored in the years following hurricane katrina and they are happy that the president is coming here, and they want him to pay attention to this. another update right now, in terms of power outages, about

125,000 people are still without power in louisiana and the main power company here has been able to restore about 84% of the power in this state. tamron? >> gabe, what is the army corps of engineers saying in response to these questions as to whether or not the levy protection system in new orleans caused some of the damage that we're seeing there? >> reporter: really right now they are saying, tamron, that it's too early to tell. they are investigating, as you mention. they plan to run computer models over the next month to see if the flood protection really did protect the smaller communities outside, but we spoke with someone from the army corps yesterday and they feel the impact from new orleans' flood protection system would be minimal, but again, they are just checking it out. tamron? >> again, later today, president obama will be in that area surveying the damage. gabe, thank you very much. coming up, president obama's big convention speech is

thursday, and certainly a lot rests on how he answers the question why he should be reelected. this as we are learning mitt romney may have misfired with his rnc speech. more on his record-low rating in the gallup poll out just today. plus, an update to the story about the stolen secret service van that was carrying equipment for vice president joe biden's speech. who took the van? led the company to more than $3 million in revenue in three years, but some bad decisions caused sales to plummet to a tenth of that. instead of giving up, mellody got her mba and took what she learned to build her company. you know what i love about this country?

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look at that video, the fire has destroyed more than 3,000 acres so far. thankfully, no reports of injury or property damage. coming up, the u.s. suspends training of new afghan recruits after a surge in attacks on nato forces. the question now, does this undermine the u.s. mission in afghanistan? plus, the latest on what happened with a crazy monster truck crash this weekend. and for the first time, president obama gives his reaction to clint eastwood's empty-chair speech. we'll tell you what the president had to say, or show you. it's just one of the things we thought you should know. be sure to check out our "news nation" page. reminder, of course, the president's big speech is thursday. we're going to take you back live to charlotte after a quick break. [ male announcer ] this is anna, her long day teaching the perfect swing

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political news as we dig deeper into this new gallup poll just out today that we mentioned earlier. it not only shows governor romney got little or no bump from his convention speech, but his speech rated lower. so what went wrong, is it too early to assume his speech was not a success? let's bring in nbc news department political editor. pleasure to have you on. >> thanks, tamron. >> this speech was ranked against bush, kerry, mccain, and, of course, obama in 2008, and it fell short at least in this first poll. >> it's certainly something that the romney campaign is going to have to worry about a little bit. i do think it probably speaks to the overall level of disappointment in this entire campaign. there's really been a no joy in mudville campaign, lots of negative attacks, a lot of people you saw a month ago, look, 90% of the people have their minds made up and don't

even want to hear anymore about the candidates, so could be something people are a little disappointed in both campaigns. the other thing, though, this does represent an opportunity and challenge from the obama campaign to sort of take that and run with it and have an opportunity here to really, you know, blow past that, but it is a challenge as well, because if they don't and we see the similar numbers, you're really looking at a pretty negative campaign. >> but under that assumption, if it is a tone or where people are, 2008, it wasn't as if we were all holding hand. we certainly saw a great divide in this country as well, and romney's speech comes far shorter in the numbers than mccain's 47%. >> yeah, it does, and i think that's something that the romney campaign is going to have to take a look at and wonder what they are going to have to be able to do. all that said, we still have a very tight race. there's a poll out here in north carolina with romney up 4 points. we've seen our polling very tight. it is these two factors of the

economy versus likability. the economy's a drag on the president, but likability, been a problem for mitt romney. >> it's interesting you bring up the likability question, and we've talked a lot about that, but i'm curious, is there maybe too much emphasis on that? in romney's speech, he talked about his religion, he talked about his family and told intimate stories regarding his family, but when it came to, for example, the question of how he would create those 12 million jobs, he says he could. there was no answer that followed. he did not bring up the war in afghanistan, but has been critical of the president naming a date, as he put it, for withdrawal there. so is there, perhaps, too much emphasis on likability when you have millions of people who certainly would like to like you, but would love to have a job more? >> yeah, there's no question that the economy is most important. likability and those kinds of soft factors matter a lot more in elections where there are good times, but people do want to root for their president. they want to say this is the

person who i want to see in my living room for the next four years. obama supporters are also going to have to realize economy is the issue and the problem for the romney folks is they haven't put a lot of meat on the bones when it comes to that. the obama people i'm going to look for this week if they talk about their deficit reduction plan, something we didn't see a lot of from the romney/ryan folks. >> we already know even today joe biden referred to the medicaid fan brought up by the republicans as voucher care. that's likely something we'll hear as well. >> no question we're going to have to have the red flags up listening for all the facts that are going to come out from this convention, as we did last week with the republican convention too, tamron. >> absolutely, thank you very much. great pleasure having you on. enjoy charlotte. delegates are now streaming in. you saw the people behind him, they are streaming into charlotte. a new poll today, dominico

mentioned this poll, 4-point lead in battleground state and ahead of tomorrow's kickoff what's being called carolina fest is being held in charlotte today, some good music and fun. protesters have been taking aim at what they call corporate greed and bad politics. mark potter joins us from outside the convention. mark, we know a lot of those same protesters wanted to go to tampa, they were impacted by the weather, as was the start of the rnc. >> reporter: exactly right, and some of them that did go to tampa are here now. photographers recognize some of the people in the crowd. today's a quiet one in terms of protests. there is carolina fest, a welcome to charlotte with entertainment and music. police tell us there have been no incidents today, no arrests, the protests will resume tomorrow at pre-scheduled locations. they'll go through the

convention tuesday, wednesday, thursday. relatively small groups going one after the other throughout the day as agreed to with the authorities here. the big march actually was yesterday, about 800 activists were walking through the uptown area, past some of those banks and the power company where they stopped and held rallies complaining about corporate greed, complaining about environmental degradation and other issues, immigration policy, abortion policy, women's rights, antiwar sentiment was expressed. the protesters were going to have, perhaps, several thousand people. as it turned out, 750 to 800. it was all very peaceful. seemed to be an agreement between the protesters and the police. they got along fairly well. there was a lot of police here, thousands of them, lining the parade route, running a command center watching everything going on. i don't know if you can hear the helicopters over me, they are

cameras and are watching. but it's been a peaceful event. there has been a lot of talk planning this and everyone hopes that's the way it remains. right now, no real problems. >> and mark, the atmosphere-wise, beyond that, you've been able to walk around and hear from folks, and it is interesting we were just talking with dominico, we know there's a great divide in this country happening, quite honestly, because of what's happening in washington. what are folks saying to you there that you've been able to talk with? >> reporter: they are glad to have their say finally. this is their week, and the people of this town are saying, and no one's going to spoil it. they are going to make sure that everybody has a good time, everybody is able to say what they have to say. there's no distractions. that seems to be the case. the protesters did get to say what they have to say. the police made sure they have that opportunity, and one scene i saw yesterday, the leader of the parade came up to the police

chief and said, sir, we're about to begin in five minutes. the police said back to him, thank you, i appreciate that. then the march went and no problems. >> thank you, appreciate you sticking around giving us that live report. four years ago president obama won north carolina. the president won by less than .4 of a percent, just over 14,000 votes, specifically, but since then, a lot has happened to the president's base there. nbc's craig melvin has more. >> in downtown charlotte, summer was different four years ago. >> it was crazy, man. >> reporter: barbers remember the steady stream of eager campaign volunteers who stopped by the shop to register new voters. >> they had flyers everywhere. everywhere was obama. >> reporter: nearby at unc charlotte, 28-year-old grad student adam recalls being captivated. >> thought he kind of unified people. >> thank you, north carolina! >> reporter: young people and black voters were the bedrocks

of president obama's support in the tar heel state. he snagged 95% of the black vote and 74% of voters under 30. but this time, many of them are unenthused and frustrated. >> sometimes he wasn't really willing to stand up for things he thought was worth pushing for. >> he hasn't communicated well to the country. >> kind of scary graduating college and there's not really many jobs. >> reporter: that may be the biggest wrench in the obama machine. the state's stubborn unemployment rate, 9.6% in july, well above the national average and the fifth highest in america. and voters have been bombarded with ads and web videos like this one, tying the president to the joblessness. mitt romney and the group supporting him have poured $33.3 million dollars in ads in north carolina. obama and his groups, $22 million. >> clearly, the republicans have the advantage in the air war. >> reporter: rob christensen, who's covered politics here for

nearly four decades points out team obama's ground game is legendary. >> they never really left the state since the 2008 campaign and have been heavily organizing since last year. republicans are now beginning to organize. >> reporter: more than 40 campaign officers like this one in raleigh. mitt romney's campaign has 19 like this one in charlotte that opened in may. >> we're going to continue to take our message to the voters. we're not in the contest to see who can open the most offices or anything like that. >> reporter: they are betting ads and apathy will be enough to close the narrowest of gaps. in north carolina, craig melvin, nbc news. we're going to now turn to afghanistan. is the mission there undermined, that's what some are asking following the pentagon's announcement they are suspending some training. this follows a surge in attacks on u.s. and other coalition troops. joining me now, military analyst and retired army colonel jack

jacobs. you were one of the first, i saw you on "nightly news" as saying this could be undermining there. >> the president's plan we start withdrawing in 2014, but we have to get from here to there and we're not going to be able to do it unless we train the afghans. training has not been going well, and now that we decided that we're going to pull back from training some of the police because we haven't vetted them properly and that we're going to find different ways to vet them so that we can have some semblance of security there leads one to think that, in fact, we've already decided that as soon as the election's over, we're going to start withdrawing even more quickly. >> is that the logical conclude? in one instance the gun had been handed to one individual trained and he turned the gun on the soldiers on the spot. >> supposedly, these people are vetted, checked out. >> how are they vetted in the first place? >> that's a very good question, indeed. in the past, they've only taken their word for the fact they are not bad guys, and if they are

not going to take their word, who else's word are they going to take? the fact is, there is not a real plan. there's no good way to make sure these people are not bad guys, and, in fact, the whole idea of taking a very short time to train the police and the army in a very large country is quite silly indeed. >> should this have been anticipated? >> yeah, we've been in afghanistan for ten years, and, you know, you'd think after ten years we'd know exactly what we're doing and how we're going to do it. we do not. we do not have the political will to stay there and implement the things we need to in order to make sure that afghans are safe, americans are safe. i think things are going to get more violent over time. >> interesting with mitt romney's speech, and we talked some of about it, his advisers saying listen he's given a speech regarding this, but you make this point, which all ties into the politics we're discussing in charlotte. after this election, what will happen? >> yeah, i think there are already plans on the board to

accelerate the withdrawal. my guess is the instant the election is over, if the president is reelected, he will issue instructions to make sure we start to evacuate more quickly. it's not going to take all that much time, but quite frankly, it's going to be violent from then till now, even once the order is issued to evacuate more quickly, i think it's going to be very, very violent and after that too. >> thank you so much. thursday night, president obama gives his big speech, of course, at the outdoor bank of america stadium in charlotte. up next, will the weather cooperate? first, some things we just thought you should know. police have recovered a u-haul truck stolen after the secret service rented it for vice president joe biden's visit to detroit. the van was stolen from a hotel parking lot and found today. what did the president think of clint eastwood's invisible obama in a chair at the rnc? today, mr. obama called himself a huge eastwood fan and said of

being president, "if you're easily offended, you should probably choose another occupation." the response to the eastwood speech ended up being the most popular tweet of the rnc. the tweet showed the president, of course, sitting in the oval office with the caption "this seat's taken." and there you go. the white house has released the recipe for its home-brewed beer. the ingredients for the ale include hops and chocolate malt. okay. and paul ryan now says he did not run a marathon in less than three hours of the surprise. in an interview last week, ryan said he ran a "two hour and 50-something marathon." but ryan actually ran the marathon in four hours and one minute. ryan responded, "the race was more than 20 years ago." also, sarah palin has ryan beat

by seconds. she once ran a marathon in three hours and 59 minutes. those are the things we just thought you should know. hey! did you know that honey nut cheerios has oats that can help lower cholesterol? and it tastes good? sure does! wow. it's the honey, it makes it taste so... well, would you look at the time... what's the rush? be happy. be healthy.

welcome back. while hurricane isaac largely spared tampa and the republican convention, now it's the democrats turn to keep their eyes on the weather. the president obama speech scheduled to take place at an outdoor stadium thursday night. all eyes are on the weather. let's bring in todd santos with a preview of the forecast. doesn't look too bad today, todd. >> this is a far better picture than we had going into at least tampa. charlotte this thursday, will see a chance for thunderstorms, we have seen a couple around portions of north carolina so far today. a quick look first at the big picture. here's kind of a concept what's going on across the area. we have the ridge across the east here, so what's left the

moisture that isaac brought up through the central gulf coast is still in the atmosphere here, so we will see pockets of heavier showers pushing towards the east and some of that working its way into the carolinas in the form of some thunderstorms. mid to late week, still have a couple fronts in the area, that keeps the chances for showers going around north carolina and portions of the mid atlantic, so for folks traveling there, similar to today with delays around d.c., atlanta, newark, la guardia. there's the forecast for charlotte to give you an idea, primarily afternoon thunderstorm chances. friday looks like the pick of the whole thing as far as the best day out there with temperatures topping out in the 80s. that's kind of a look at the whole week itself. this is a look at some of that daytime heating today with some of the heavier pockets of showers to the east of charlotte. it has slowed things down air traffic wise. three inches worth of rainfall, so we may see some pockets of

potential severe weather here. more of a chance for afternoon thunderstorms and some of that going on right now to the south and east of atlanta. also, a good stretch of the 95 from the low country south carolina down to just north of jacksonville, some slow going out on the roadways there. i did want to leave you with the forecast for thursday itself. so again, most folks that are headed down to the convention at least want to be prepared, bring a raincoat and anticipate some showers and thunderstorms, especially later on in the day. >> thank you, todd. greatly appreciate it. a deadly crash at an iowa air show tops our look at stories around the news nation today. a fighter jet crash that killed a 59-year-old veteran pilot over the weekend. the soviet-era jet was flying in formation when it nose dived and crashed into a field. no spectators were hurt. another crash this weekend also caught on tape, a monster truck barrelled into a crowd of spectators at a race in harrisburg, oregon. the announcer for the race said

the truck's hydraulic steering went out of control, causing the driver to lose control of that car. three spectators were hurt. none of their injuries, though, life threatening. the coast guard has rescued actor russell crowe. he and his friend got lost kayaking last night. the master and commander star called out for help and was picked up by a passing patrol boat. crowe later tweeted a big thank you to the coast guard. looks so different with the beard. up next, a preview of tonight's documentary "barack obama history" hosted by chris matthews. check us out on facebook, facebook.com/, you know the rest, newsnation. technology helps make you a better investor. with our revolutionary e-trade 360 dashboard you see exactly where your money is and what it's doing live. our e-trade pro platform offers powerful functionality that's still so usable you'll actually use it.

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of course, you can join the news nation on our twitter page, @newsnation. tonight, msnbc will air a

documentary on barack obama. barack obama ran on a slogan, of course, of hope and change, but late in 2008 election cycle, an economic crisis redefined the nation's challenges. a look at what president obama inherited when he took the oath of office. >> i, barack hussein obama, do solemnly swear. >> the grand expectations of this historic occasion were clashing with the fierce urgency of the challenges. >> starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking america. >> probably no one since roosevelt has entered office with that sense of crisis, that sense of burden. >> the problems waiting for him on the oval office desk included two wars, a broken health care system, an economy on the verge of collapse, millions facing foreclosure, a jobless rate spiking relentlessly skyward.

>> tomorrow, another dismal jobs report along with the 2.6 million jobs last year, we lost half a million jobs each month for the last two months. >> but while all agreed on its ferocity, the crisis failed to unite a polarized country. the president decided to push through the biggest economic stimulus in history. >> there you go, it's done. >> the stimulus and the $80 billion auto rescue that followed burned through much of the political capital obama had hoped to cash for health care reform, a key promise he had made to the american people. >> madam speaker. >> the president of the united states. >> with the economy still on shaky ground, the president decided this was an issue to take on early in his presidency or forfeit it entireentirely. >> the time for bickering is over. the time for games has passed. now is the season for action.

now is when we must bring the best ideas of both parties together and show the american people that we can still do what we were sent here to do. now is the time to deliver on health care. >> a reminder, you can see "barack obama making history" tonight 10:00 p.m. eastern time only on msnbc. that does it for this edition of "news nation." see you back here tomorrow when i talk with congressman chris van hallum. in the meantime, "the cycle" is next. em or don't. whatever man. either way, he gets to fly helicopters all day. i'm talking da vinci style flying machines! he's datin' kayla, the lotion girl. able, bodied, athleticism. here's his buddy marko, who's got the hot water for his velveeta shells & cheese. achieve your dreams. liquid gold! eat like that guy you know.

begins with back pain and a choice. take advil, and maybe have to take up to four in a day. or take aleve, which can relieve pain all day with just two pills. good eye. i'm toure. it's labor day, but the cyclists are hard at work. all work but no play for the democrats. who are we kidding, maybe a little bit of play, but no naked swimming. i'm s.e. cupp, the obama team is also hard at work, trying to extinguish the firestorm created by statements about americans who don't have a job. in 2008,